Thieves 'cloning' vehicle log books

The identities of tens of thousands of cars have been stolen over the past two years with thieves cloning registration log books, according to the Association of Chief Police Officers.

Police officers and the DVLA are targeting rising levels of the offence, as it is revealed 11,000 cars worth more than £13 million have had their identities stolen.

Officers are recovering around 10 faked log books per week, Acpo's Mark Hooper said. He also revealed that up to 130,000 blank registration documents have been taken and not yet found.

The papers went missing from the DVLA in 2006 and allow thieves to copy the details of anyone's car.

If thieves have stolen a specific model, they can make it look legitimate by using details of another car of the same make in the log book.

The DVLA said that it runs a hotline for car buyers to double check that a registration certificate is valid.

A spokesman said: "DVLA provides every assistance to help people avoid this, including running an information hotline for the public to check whether a certificate may be invalid prior to the purchase of a vehicle."